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polarbear4's avatar

so sad, for me and the world. I was soooo excited and believe RFK could have had a groundswell of ex-Bernie bros. Bernie raised millions from us and an army of texters, phone calls. I support so much of what he supports, but his stubborn insistence on looking the other way as tens of thousands are blown to bits, starved, their libraries, schools and hospitals ruined forever, not to mention their homes. No other word besides genocide.

and as you point out, this is an indigenous people. perhaps Charles would cheer on our genocide of the native peoples that were here when we "founded" America. I feel so badly to see well-intentioned people so captured by the "both sidism" and "woke" culture. was a dem all my life until I had to leave during the last election cycle and I am so sick of the righteous hatred of both sides, but especially the woke crowd. many of my friends/acquaintances are in that crowd and it's frustrating and maddening but I care for them.

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Roscoe's avatar

Katya here.

Charles Eisenstein. He's enormously popular. He's sort of a sacred warrior for justice in the tikkun olam way. See his website for a 6 minute oration on "Moving Towards Interbeing".

A friend, a Franciscan Deacon, sent me Eisenstein's book, "Sacred Economies" years ago, with the exhortation: must read. I hadn't yet read any of Michael Hoffman and did not know what "conjunction of opposites" meant, but everywhere stumbled across deep contradictions and shallow glosses of history to arrive at a "What the Bleep Do We Know" (remember that movie?) summation of world woes in the history of money. Also a kind of precursor to "you will own nothing and be happy" . Truly seductive reading with lovely language and utopian ideas and an elegant solution to everything.

Here's a quote: "Debt can endure forever. Wealth cannot, because it's physical dimension is subject to the laws of entropy." --Frederick Soddy, an economist of the 30's that he admires, p. 203, under chapter 12, on Negative Interest Economies.

On p. 454, in a discussion of quantum money, he quotes his "dear ex-wife, Patsy : " Money is not yours until you spend it."

Ah, the poetry of disguise and the credo of our consumer society. And the New Age religion.

On his essay "How to Heal the Wound of Gaza": I understand (despite my little brain) that Christ's combat with the Pharisees was mortal, and that he nowhere in the Gospel granted them amnesty. Salvation is not amnesty (correct me if I'm wrong).

St. John Chrysostom tells us that repentance involves first of all contrition -- recognition and responsibility for your sins BEFORE there can be forgiveness.

But sin isn't part of Eisenstein's thinking, and he quotes Rosseau and Marx frequently. And did he miss the part of one of Finkelstein's recent interviews about 97% of Israelis approving the destruction of Gaza? Still, E's writing is hauntingly seductive. "The righting of historical wrongs will emerge indirectly." ????? Creative solution: "Two states, one Homeland."

But what of all the Palestinian blood that has been shed? What of all the murdered children? This sounds like The Grand Inquisitor (tho' I told my Franciscan friend that E didn't seem to have read Dostoevsky, especially not "Crime and Punishment".) E mentions Christ twice in his book on Sacred Economies, if not disrespectfully, somewhat dismissively.

Sorry to be so wordy!!! But Eisenstein has captured young, New Age minds and is a force to be reckoned with.

In short: when is a door not a door?

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